Butterfield (Letters, 491, n. 3) comments that this "Rejoinder" is "one of BR's most effective statements of his humanitarian principles.
Accused of a dangerous rejection of Mosaic law, BR retorted that 'It becomes Christians to beware how far they condemn the popular virtue of humanity, because it is recommended by deists,' and goes on to cite the contributions of Voltaire, Beccaria, and others." (see also 1788-6)
From Catalog II
Rush's response to critics of his capital punishment arguments, demonstrating that the debate was not one-sided and that Rush was willing to engage his opponents directly in print. The same polemical style that characterized his yellow fever publications -- confident, data-citing, morally absolute -- appears here in the legal context. Rush had the same relationship to his opponents in the punishment debate that he had to his opponents in the epidemic debate: he was right, they were wrong, and he was willing to say so.
Cite this object as“Rush- Rejoinder to murder by death.” The Soiferman Collection, BR-2023.052, Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. EIS LIBRIS, https://eislibris.com/objects/rush-rejoinder-to-murder-by-death (accessed [date]).
